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SC4 Plop And Paint DLL  v0.9.1

   (5 Reviews)

1 Screenshot

About This File

SC4 Plop and Paint is a DLL plugin for SimCity 4 that adds an in-game Advanced Plopping & Painting panel. It lets you browse your installed lots, plop lots directly, paint props and flora, create reusable weighted prop families, paint terrain decals, and quickly build detailed scenes without repeatedly hunting through menus or hand-placing every item.

The plugin is aimed at players with large Plugins folders, city-detailing workflows, MMP-style flora work, prop-heavy scenes, and lot-testing setups. It includes a cache builder that scans your SC4 installation and Plugins folders, reads exemplar/cohort data, and generates searchable lot, prop, flora, decal, thumbnail, and family data for the in-game DLL.

NOTE: This is a newer version compared to the last version that was available on the STEX before the Simtropolis reset! It now comes with prop/lot/flora picking functionality, better support for seasonal props AND texture painting!

The GitHub release v0.9.1 with attestation and SHA256 checksums is available at https://github.com/caspervg/sc4-plop-and-paint/releases/tag/v0.9.1

image.png.10756dae973a0db1cb367a5c8ee96454.png

Main features

  • In-game Advanced Plopping & Painting window, opened with O by default
  • Buildings & Lots browser for finding and plopping lots, including growables
  • Props browser with thumbnails, favorites, scene picking, and paint mode
  • Prop Families tab for built-in families and custom weighted random prop palettes
  • Flora browser and Flora Collections for painting single flora, families, and multi-stage chains
  • Decals tab for painting texture decals on terrain and lot surfaces
  • Direct paint, line paint, and polygon fill modes
  • Grid overlay, snapping, rotation, spacing, density, density variation, and preview controls
  • Pending placement workflow with undo before committing
  • Prop strip mode for removing placed city, lot, and street props
  • Favorites and recent paint history for faster repeat workflows
  • Seasonal thumbnails where supported by the source content

Dependency

SC4 Plop and Paint requires SC4RenderServices v0.6.2 or newer. You can download it from the GitHub releases at this link or from the STEX page below:


Usage instructions

Full player guide, including screenshots, tab-by-tab controls, paint hotkeys, strip mode, decal options, and example workflows:
https://github.com/caspervg/sc4-advanced-plop/blob/main/docs/USAGE.md

Project page:
https://github.com/caspervg/sc4-advanced-plop

Demo video:

 

System Requirements

  • SimCity 4 version 1.1.641.x
  • 64-bit Windows for the bundled cache builder
  • SC4RenderServices v0.6.2 or newer
  • Microsoft Visual C++ 2015-2022 Redistributable x86
  • Microsoft Visual C++ 2015-2022 Redistributable x64
  • DirectX/hardware rendering mode recommended for overlay previews and decal rendering

Installation

  1. Close SimCity 4.
  2. Install SC4RenderServices first.
  3. Run the included SC4 Plop and Paint installer.
  4. Select your SimCity 4 installation folder.
  5. Select your SimCity 4 Plugins folder.
  6. Choose the thumbnail/cache settings.
  7. Let the installer build the cache, or run Rebuild-Cache.cmd later.
  8. Start SimCity 4, load a city, and press O to open the panel.

The installer places SC4PlopAndPaint.dll, SC4PlopAndPaint.dat, and SC4PlopAndPaint.ini in your Plugins folder. It also installs _SC4PlopAndPaintCacheBuilder.exe and Rebuild-Cache.cmd under Documents\SimCity 4\SC4PlopAndPaint\.

Rebuild the cache whenever you add, remove, or change plugins. Or when upgrade or install SC4PlopAndPaint.

Configuration

The plugin reads settings from SC4PlopAndPaint.ini in your Plugins folder.

[SC4PlopAndPaint]
; Logging verbosity: trace, debug, info, warn, error, critical, off
LogLevel=info

; Write SC4PlopAndPaint.log in the directory above your Plugins folder. Disable if you don't want log files.
LogToFile=true

; Disable this if you want prop painting without the draw-service overlay preview.
EnableDrawOverlay=true

; Direct-mode preview default: outline, full, combined
DefaultPropPreviewMode=combined

; Default paint popup values
DefaultShowGridOverlay=true
DefaultSnapPointsToGrid=false
DefaultSnapPlacementsToGrid=false
DefaultGridStepMeters=16.0

; Thumbnail display size in the UI (22-176, default 44)
ThumbnailDisplaySize=44

; Thumbnail slot colors shown behind transparent thumbnails in the UI.
; Accepts RRGGBB or RRGGBBAA.
; Set either option to an empty value to make it transparent.
; Defaults: background=425066, border=5B6B84
;ThumbnailBackgroundColor=425066
;ThumbnailBorderColor=5B6B84
;ThumbnailBackgroundColor=
;ThumbnailBorderColor=

; Recent paint quick-swap overlay and history
EnableRecentPaints=true

; Maximum number of recent paint entries to keep (1-16, default 8).
; Only the first 8 previous entries get number-key shortcuts; later ones stay click-only.
RecentPaintMaxItems=8

; What to do with uncommitted placements when switching paint targets:
; discard = remove uncommitted placed items before switching
; commit  = keep placed items and finalize them before switching
; keep    = leave uncommitted placed items in place when switching
PaintSwitchPolicy=keep

Most players can leave the defaults unchanged. ThumbnailDisplaySize may be useful on high-resolution displays.

3rd party code

  • SC4RenderServices - GNU LGPL v2.1
  • gzcom-dll - GNU LGPL v2.1
  • Dear ImGui - MIT License
  • reflect-cpp - MIT License
  • spdlog - MIT License
  • {fmt} - MIT License
  • args - MIT License
  • pugixml - MIT License
  • yyjson - MIT License
  • stb - MIT / Public Domain
  • Windows Implementation Library - MIT License
  • libsquish - MIT License
  • mio - MIT License
  • jsoncons - Boost Software License 1.0
  • utfcpp - Boost Software License 1.0
  • ctre - Apache License 2.0 with LLVM Exceptions
  • raylib - zlib/libpng
  • GLFW - zlib/libpng
  • Fira Mono - SIL Open Font License 1.1

 

  • Like 18
  • Thanks 5



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rsc204

   3 of 3 members found this review helpful 3 / 3 members

Jawdropping, this mod basically makes MMPs, T21s and much custom lotting redundant. Sure, they might still be a part of my workflow, but the number of times I've stopped during play, to mod or alter some annoying detail that's now gonna be solved by 'plop that there'. It's frankly bonkers to think we can do this City Skylines level stuff in SimCity 4!

I have yet only simply tried it out, however I already know that this will indispensable for the scene creators out there. We can now deploy anything almost anywhere, its not simply a case of another method of doing things, but also its essentially a workaround for a lot of things you couldn't easily, if at all, do previously.

Can't thank you enough for making this work.

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SC4 gamer

   3 of 3 members found this review helpful 3 / 3 members

Probably the most revolutionary mod out there in terms of QoL features, you can now spend hours designing / beautifying even just one single lot in your city with everything your mod folder has to offer!

It's incredibly versatile and easy to use and pretty much a must have in my opinion if you really like details in your city. 

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Broonie

   2 of 2 members found this review helpful 2 / 2 members

After years of messing around with PIM, trying and failing to make MMPs and getting frustrated at the grass below my HSR tracks, I cannot put into words how important this mod is for those who like detailed cities. It doesn't just improve SC4, it reinvents it completely. If you haven't played SC4 for a while, or find it tiring scrolling through props in the lot editor, this will seriously change your life. You can literally shove a load of prop packs and textures into your plugins and build your lots INSIDE SC4. On a par, if not better and more important, than the NAM in terms of turning SC4 into something different entirely. You absolutely need to have this mod, even if you use it once to fill in an annoying diagonal.

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11241036

   2 of 2 members found this review helpful 2 / 2 members

Incredible mod. Surely as much of a breakthrough as the NAM. Makes so many things regarding designing much easier. So many new possibilites to created detailed scenes. Thank you for all your effort you've put into this!

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justforfun

   2 of 2 members found this review helpful 2 / 2 members

Texture painting too? Oh my, you've just managed to make an astounding mod even more incredible. Absolutely fantastic work. 

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